: 2006: Queens Tribune, Year End Review

Blackout Slams Boro

Queens residents were beset by a plague of darkness in the summer of 2006, as 10 of 22 feeder cable power conduits in the borough failed, leaving thousands of residents in Sunnyside, Long Island City and Astoria without power, some for more than a week.

Businesses lost hundreds of thousands of dollars, residents were forced to seek relief from the heat and borough legislators cried foul as the utility scrambled to restore service.

On July 18, when the power conduits in the northwest corner of the borough failed, the company claimed that only 2,000 of their customers were without power, but residents in many parts of the borough registered their disagreement.

“There’s nothing else to do besides sit outside,” said one Astoria resident. “They said that there are only about 2,000 people in the area affected by this blackout, but if you walked along Ditmars Boulevard, you would easily see that there’s more than that.”

Borough officials were quick to come to the defense of their constituents.

“They have only one responsibility, and that’s getting power from here to there,” said City Councilman Peter Vallone Jr. (D-Astoria), standing on the corner of 31st Street and Ditmars Avenue, only two blocks from several power plants. “Down the street, they generate 60 percent of the power for New York City, and they can’t get it from there to here.”

Even as customers complained that their services were not fully restored and as U.S. Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-Astoria) released a survey saying that uninsured businesses had lost an average of more than $12,000, the company stood behind its usual reimbursement policy. ConEd repays private customers up to $350 for lost food and medicine and businesses $7,000. According to the Maloney survey, some businesses lost as much as $100,000.

“Astoria businesses got their power back, but they’re still waiting for fair compensation for their losses,” Maloney said at the time. “$7,000 is just a drop in the bucket for some of the hardest-hit businesses in my district. Con Ed’s aging and unreliable power grid caused this mess and they need to offer much more help to businesses devastated by the blackout.”

As a final response, ConEd pledged to add 250 phones to their call center, and more emergency workers to respond to situations that might arise in the future. The company also promised to replace the infrastructure in the area.
“The real answer is that we’re rebuilding that entire network, so, all of it, cables, transformers, manholes; everything that was damaged is going to be brand new, within weeks, if not months,” said Media Relations Director Michael Clendenin.

Sex, Danger, Fences Highlight Our Parks

It was an exciting year for Queens green spaces, as everything from fire, disappearing trees, crumbling monuments and illicit sex made the parks of the borough a battleground for civic leaders and park advocates.

2006 saw Willow Lake Nature Preserve reopened briefly, the Parks Department lit and relit the FAA safety light on the World’s Fair Towers. In Forest Hills, Forest Park became the site of intense police focus as the 102nd Precinct launched a task force to drive out illicit public sex in the area.

“Unless these gentlemen are advised to ‘get a room,’ Forest Park remains a great place to explore an archaeological collection of used condoms, their wrappers and litter,” said Ivan Mrakovcic, chairman of Community Board 9.

2006 also marked the sixth year that Willow Lake Trail had been closed to the public, after vandals burned a vital wooden bridge in the southwest corner of the park. During those six years, the area was largely untouched, even by Parks Dept. employees, and it rapidly became overgrown with weeds and insects.

After the park came to the attention of borough civic leaders, including City Councilwoman Melinda Katz, Willow Lake once again became the focus of a renaissance effort in the borough.

“I respectfully request that the existing safe paths be cleared so that area residents are able to utilize and enjoy this beautiful park safely,” Katz wrote in a letter to Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe.

With some hard work by clearing crews and some preliminary reconstruction on the burned bridge, the Park was able to temporarily open its doors to the public in the fall, a good faith gesture that Willow Lake Trail is on the rebound.

The Parks Department also had a lot on its plate just north of Willow Lake, as the aging “Tent of Tomorrow” and World’s Fair Observation tower both began to show the effects of neglect at New York State Pavilion. The FAA warning light on the observation tower, required by a regulation that states any structure over 200 feet tall near an airport bear a warning light, went out, and was unlit for months. When it was finally reset, the light illuminated the neglect the Pavilion has faced in recent years.

Amid numerous reports that said the “Tent of Tomorrow” was deteriorating, the Parks Dept. maintained it only by a series of shallow investigations.
“Structural deterioration is more like a cancer; it jumps,” said Edward Kelly of the Meyer Structural Engineer Firm. “It accelerates. I can’t give you a date or time, but if this continues to be left alone or neglected, eventually something will give.”

Queens Loses 5 In ‘06

In 2006 the total number of American Servicemen and women who lost their lives in Iraq reached the 3000 plateau, a tragic number that represents more than three years of conflict and unrest in an increasingly unstable region.

The borough of Queens has lost 17 young men and women since the war began in March of 2003, including five in 2006. The Tribune recognizes the men and women of Queens who gave their lives in service of our nation.

• Spec. Marlon A. Bustamante, of Corona, was killed when a bomb detonated near his humvee in Baghdad on Feb 1, 2006. He was 25.

• Sgt. Jose Gomez, of Corona, was killed by a makeshift bomb during combat operations, April 28, 2006. He was 23.

• Cpl. Julian A. Ramon, of Flushing, was killed during combat operations in Anbar Province, July 22, 2006. He was 22.

• Sgt. Denise A. Lannaman, of Bayside, was killed in non-combat operations in Kuwait on Oct. 1, 2006. She was 46.

• Spec. Justin R. Garcia, of Elmhurst, was killed during combat operations in Baghdad on Nov. 14, 2006. He was 26.

We extend our condolences to the family and friends of these brave soldiers who lost their lives in service of their country.

Racial Division Eyed In Wake Of Shooting

Queens was the site of a highly publicized and oft-disputed police shooting in November, as Sean Bell, a 23 year-old St. Albans man, was killed the morning of his wedding while leaving the Kalua Cabaret in Jamaica.

Fifty shots were fired at a car driven by Bell, by a total of five policemen on the scene, several who were undercover officers. Two other men, Joseph Guzman and Trent Benefield, were injured in the incident; none of the victims were carrying weapons.

Benefield later testified that police fired on him as he was running away, and a security video released showed bullets fired striking targets as far afield as the window of a nearby AirTrain station.

For days after the shooting, there was speculation that a fourth man, who may have been armed, escaped the car and fled the scene, though it was later proved to be nothing more than rumor.

The shooting ignited weeks of racial tension in New York City, as the NYPD was accused of employing tactics that unfairly target African Americans in the community. The Rev. Al Sharpton rallied the people of Queens to his banner, encouraging demonstrations, including a march down Fifth Avenue in Manhattan on one of the busiest shopping days of the year. The march was attended by civic leaders and government representatives from all over the City and the borough of Queens, including U.S. Rep. Gregory Meeks, Bell’s congressman.

“The idea is not to march and then forget,” Meeks said. “The march is just something to put the city on notice that, though two, three weeks have gone, people have their eyes on what’s going on.”

The shooting fell immediately under the jurisdiction of Queens DA Richard Brown, who started an investigation in earnest on Nov. 25, the day of the shooting.

“I will be guided only by the law and the facts.” Brown said after the shooting. “I will reach no conclusions until the investigation is complete. There will be no rush to judgment.”

Brown has emphasized the importance of being thorough ever since, and the investigation is still ongoing.

“In my 16 years as DA, it’s one of the more important investigations,” said Brown. By year’s end the investigation was continuing.

‘06 Political Scandals

Political scandal was the first order of business in 2006, as the year started with labor leader and Queens Assemblyman Brian McLaughlin as the target of an FBI raid.

From there, the ball rolled steadily downhill, as State Sen. Ada Smith was reprimanded by her own party and charged with third degree assault in an abuse incident against one of her own staff members.

Queens Supreme Court Justice Laura Blackburne was removed from the bench for her role in helping a robbery suspect evade arrest in her very own courtroom in 2004.

Finally, Alan Hevesi, just days before he would have retaken the oath of office for his position as State Comptroller, pleaded guilty to a Class-E felony in Albany for using a state-funded driver as a personal chauffeur to his wife.

The actions of these Queens civil servants help to explain the record-setting mandate that Gov. Eliot Spitzer received when he rode his “Day One: Everything Changes” campaign slogan to victory in the November Gubernatorial election.

Authorities said at the outset of the McLaughlin investigation that the labor leader and Assemblyman could possibly have been at the top of the food-chain in a traffic light bid-rigging scandal, but when the dust settled, McLaughlin stared at the business end of 43 individual charges, including racketeering, campaign finance abuse, and theft of funds from a little league.

The total amount of illegally garnered funds came to $2.2 million, a number that ended McLaughlin’s civic career and may ultimately land the former Labor Council President in jail.

Meanwhile, the punishment for State Sen. Ada Smith was levied by members of her own political party, rather than a judge. Sen. Smith was stripped of her leadership of the Senate Committee on Corporations, Authorities and Commissions, lowering her salary in the process.

Sen. Smith pleaded not guilty to the assault charges, but was eventually convicted – and thrown out of office by the voters.

The State Commission on Judicial Conduct recommended that Blackburne be removed from the bench for judicial misconduct, and the decision was ratified this past year, completing a two-year process that began in June of 2004, when the Judge was suspended for ordering a bailiff to escort a robbery suspect in her courtroom out an alternate stairwell to avoid arrest.

The most high-profile instance of misconduct on the part of an elected official came this year in the State Comptrollers office, when Queens native Alan Hevesi was caught using a state-employee as a personal chauffeur to his wife. Hevesi’s opponent in the November election reported the Comptroller to his own State Hotline, and the rest is Queens – and New York – history.

Queens Makes Progress Against Hunger

In 2006, no place in the City tackled the hunger issue like the borough of Queens. Food Stamps, free stores and the homeless were all first and foremost on the minds of legislators in the borough, as the City Council worked to find a common ground on the battle to feed underprivileged residents of Queens and New York City.

The New York City Council met with some resistance from the Mayors office while trying to increase access to Food Stamp applications. In January, Mayor Bloomberg refused to follow a piece of Council legislation that mandated access to Food Stamp applications in soup kitchens, because Bloomberg and legal counsel believed it was an order from the Council to a mayor-appointed position.

Despite the fact that Food Stamps are a federal program, and services not utilized essentially go to waste, Leslie Annexstein, Director of the Homelessness Outreach and Prevention Project, said that three quarters of a million New Yorkers who qualify do not receive Food Stamps, leaving an estimated $1 billion a year in federal funds on the table.

“We cannot afford to let government bureaucracy give compassion a bad name,” said Councilman Eric Gioia (D-Sunnyside), who chairs the investigations committee. “We must cut the red tape and change the culture of government. There are hungry families that need our help and we’re failing them.”

As the year continued, however, great strides were made towards helping those needy New Yorkers find the meals that had so long been eluding them.

The Food Today, Healthy Tomorrow Initiative, introduced in September, sought to increase involvement in the program by 350,000. As well, Mayor Bloomberg announced an annual pledge of $150 million to establish the Office of Financial Empowerment, which will help needy New Yorkers get back on their feet.

“Hunger in New York is a big – but solvable – problem,” said City Council Speaker Christine Quinn (D-Manhattan).